Ghosts of the Past
by cliosmuse
Summary: Sequel to "A Flash Before the Eyes." When we last saw our intrepid friends, some were having heart-to-hearts; some were experiencing strange dreams; some were making sense of their lives; and some were on a Raptor bound for Earth.
1. Chapter 1

AN: This is the first chapter of my intended sequel to "A Flash Before the Eyes." If you haven't read that, this won't make sense. I say "intended" sequel because I'm not really sure how far I'll get with this. Reviews help. If you'd like the story to continue, please send them along. :-)

When we last saw our intrepid friends, some were having heart-to-hearts with Cylon friends; some were experiencing strange dreams; some were beginning to make sense of their lives; and some were in a Raptor bound toward the planet Earth.

**Ghosts of the Past  
**

**by cliosmuse  
**

**Chapter 1  
**

She stared at the grey, weather-worn tablets in front of her, lifting her fingers to the aged grooves in the stone. Took one step back, two, until her shoulder blades hit the next stone; she leaned against it, slid down it until she was sitting, but still she stared.

She heard steps behind her and felt a warm body lower itself beside her. Tentatively, he touched her arm with his fingers, then withdrew. When he spoke, his voice was still husky, even now, so long after the leap they had taken from Galactica to the waiting Raptor, the leap that had saved her from her execution. "Kara? What... what's wrong, Kara?"

She didn't look at him, just stared at the tablet before her. "Lee... can't you see what this means?" Her eyes were wide with terrified recognition. "It's all my fault, Lee. It's what the hybrid said, but I didn't understand it then. 'You are the harbinger of death, Kara Thrace....'"

He turned his eyes in the direction she looked. Carved in block capitals, the faintest hints of color buried deep in the crevices of the lettering, eight words just discernible: "You will lead them all to their end."

She stared at the words, couldn't tear her eyes from them; but it was the words beneath those, another sentence, that held him rapt. They read, simply: "There are more."

***

The day before, the six wanderers had found themselves sitting in a Raptor, approaching a dead planet. Physically proximate but in their own worlds: the journey was almost silent but for D'Anna's sporadic questions, instruments that she used to probe Kara Thrace's wounds.

"So you've outsmarted the admiral. You're on your way to Earth. The Fleet has jumped away. Success on all counts. But I have to wonder: just what do you expect to find?"

Starbuck (speechless for most of two hours, except for her first despairing cries) turned her eyes to the Cylon wearily. "Why are you here, D'Anna?"

The Cylon smiled, not her usual biting smirk, but something almost tender: there was a sad wistfulness in her eyes. "Why? Because we're not so very different, you and I." A beat. "I just want to understand what I am."

A voice from the front interrupted them: "Breaking atmosphere." They all tensed, then. Arms wrapped more tightly around isolated bodies, eyes squeezed shut, chins nodded to chests: if possible, each pulled more into himself than before. And then it was over; deep breaths were taken, shoulders fell, eyes opened. "– _hate_ that..." the doctor mumbled softly from his seat.

Maggie, then: "Where do you want me to take this bird, Starbuck?"

Panic lit in shiny eyes for a moment (from were Lee lay, huddled and alone, watching her, he caught it; his brow furrowed in confusion). Her voice was timid, came in a breathy rush. "I don't kn –" But she seemed to catch herself; inhaled, exhaled. "I – I'll show you."

Then she was in the front of the bird – where she was born to be, where she would die to be – and she seemed to them all a bit more like herself than had that shell of a woman whose fingers had stretched uselessly toward the comm system that had broadcast the sounds of Leoben's death. She took Sam's seat beside Racetack; as he moved aside for her, he squeezed her shoulder slightly, threw her a shy smile, before moving toward the back of the bird.

As she single-mindedly directed the Raptor down through the remnants of skyscrapers (all that remained were rusted girders and some masonry), Sam cautiously seated himself beside Lee's still form. "Hey, man – are you feeling okay? You hit the deck pretty hard."

Apollo turned reluctant eyes up toward the Cylon; pushed himself carefully to his seat from where he lay curled on the floor. "I'm fine. Just –" A beat. He scrubbed his hands over his face. "Just a little shell-shocked, I guess." His voice was hoarse.

Sam looked down at his hands, then away, and back again. Trying to find words that might do something. "Listen, don't take it too personally, you know? She's – she's been through a lot. She's confused. We all are."

Beside him, Lee tensed, muscles bunching across his back. He turned hard eyes toward the Cylon, bit out from between clenched teeth: "Thanks for the _advice_."

Sam shrugged. Was about to respond, but it was too late: they had set down.

***

She took them first to the first place that she had been (the first place, other than that isolated field where a downed Viper, a rusted gun, and a set of bones had rested for a thousand years). In this church she had first spoken to Anastasia Dualla in a ornately carved confessional.

The confessional was gone, now, as was most of the roof of the building (the few rafters that still stood cast elaborate shadows against the angles within the church, the sun brighter now than it had seemed a few days before). She walked the walls of the sanctuary; drew her hand along the stone housings of stained-glass windows (most of the glass long since broken by the slow shift of the building; the color of the pieces that still stubbornly clung to the frame dulled by hundreds of years of dust).

She was alone in the church; had mumbled absently before entering that she needed to pray. It was no matter: the others occupied themselves easily outside. Racetrack stayed in the Raptor to organize their food supplies; Baltar and D'Anna walked around with a small handheld particle detector. Sam made his way absently in the direction of the park, as if drawn there. And Lee –

"I need to know what's going on with you." Lee was behind her. A rough hand on her shoulder, and he turned her to face him. The sun angled through the window behind him, shadowing his features, his eyes. "I need to – I need to know that you're still with me. I –" A beat. "I came here for you."

Her face crumpled. She turned her eyes away as she threw a hand up to bat at a tear. "Don't you get it, Lee? It was all for nothing. I can't _do_ this without him. He was – he was my guide. I _needed_ him. I needed him to tell me what to do. And now I've brought you all here for nothing. I don't know where to go from here." A pause, and she looked back at him, her eyes asking him something. Something he couldn't read. "I don't know what to do."

He was quiet for a moment, and when he spoke, it was with resignation. "You've never needed anyone before, Kara." A pause. "I had hoped that when you finally did... I had hoped that it would be me."

They stood for several moments there, staring at one another. Across her face flitted pain, shock, disbelief. Her eyes tried to convey to him what her lips couldn't. But he couldn't see. As he turned, then, to leave, a voice from behind. She turned her face toward it. "Captain Thrace," the doctor asked in his high Caprican clip. Finished measuring the radiation, then. "Can you – can you read their language? Will you tell me what this says?"

When she turned back, Lee was gone, so she made her way to the doctor. "I – I'm not sure. I – I could when I was here. I did. But I don't know if I could again." She went to stand beside him at the pulpit; followed his downcast eyes to a book, fully encased in glass (she had no doubt that if the glass were removed and the pages met the air, it would dissolve before her eyes).

"There –" He pointed, and looked briefly to her, his glasses glinting. "Try."

She took a deep breath. "'I –'" A pause. "'I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt, and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters, for I know their sorrows. I –'" She faltered. "'I have come to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians, and to bring them up out of that land to a good and large land, to a land flowing with milk and honey.'"

"Go on."

The look she turned toward him was pained. "Why?"

"Because –" His voice was steady. "I need to know what it says."

"'Come now therefore, and I will send you to Pharaoh, and you may bring my people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt.'"

"And then?"

"'And Moses said to God, "Who am I, that I should go to Pharaoh, and that I should bring the children of Israel out of Egypt?"'"

"And he said?"

"'He said, "Certainly I will be with you. This will be the token to you, that I have sent you: when you have brought the people out of Egypt, you shall serve God on this mountain."'"

"And then here." His hand guided her finger. "This last line."

She was crying, now. But she did as he asked. "'He said, "Oh, Lord, please send someone else."'"

Silence, deafening. She backed away from him, from the pulpit, stumbling over the rubble behind her in her frenzy. And then, without turning to her, the doctor spoke. "But he didn't, did he, Captain Thrace? He didn't send someone else. He sent you."


	2. Chapter 2

**Ghosts of the Past  
**

**by cliosmuse  
**

**Chapter 2  
**

He entered the church just as Gaius Baltar was leaving; their shoulders brushed slightly in passing (the doctor turned nervous eyes toward him). At first he didn't see her, but then he caught the glow of her hair, illuminated by a stray sunbeam that broke through the ceiling's gaping wounds. She sat in one of few pews not yet collapsed (a precarious position, he thought). Hands in pockets, he walked toward her and took a careful seat on the bench beside her. She stared vacantly at the gold cross that still stood at the front of the church. He looked down. Their wings aligned.

"Kara, I know you're confused. I am, too."

She didn't respond, merely hugged her arms to her chest tightly.

"Listen." He sighed; scrubbed a hand through his hair, making it stand on end. "There's something I need you to know. This –" He pointed to their arms, not quite touching, and the inked wings that visually joined seamlessly. "This still means something to me."

She shook her head in frustration. Her voice was a plea. "Sammy –"

"No, let me finish. Kara, you and me – we're connected. We're connected by this. This –" He shook his head, at a loss for words; brought up his hands, gesturing around him in silent demonstration. "_This_, Kara. _This_ is why I fell in love with you. That _thing_ that existed between us, when we first met – that _thing_ that I felt so totally the first time you grinned at me on that frakking pyramid court."

She turned her head toward him, a sad smile on her face. But she didn't look at him; looked past him, as if she were struggling with something just realized. With a barely discernible nod of her head and dawning understanding (tears pricking her eyes): "_This_ is why I went back to Caprica for you. _This_ is why I married you."

"You reminded me of my wife."

"– reminded me of something I hadn't even done yet, but–" A pause. "But that I _had_."

He nodded. "Yeah. Yeah. That's what I'm trying to say to you, Kara. Just... just because it wasn't what we thought it was doesn't make it meaningless."

She looked back at the cross, then lowered her eyes to her lap, chin bowed. "I never thought it was meaningless, Sammy."

"I _do_ love you, Thrace. There's something down here, something big. And you're going to find it." He looked down at their hands, lying side by side; took, as he moved to stand, a deep breath, clasped her hand, and squeezed it. "And I'll be here for you when you do."

And then he walked away, and she was left alone among the ruins.

***

Gaius Baltar sat leaning against the ruined facade of the church. Head tilted back, he closed his eyes against the sun; saw red through his lids. The last time he'd seen the sun: on New Caprica, in reality (though most of that year he'd spent confined to Colonial One); but, in his mind's eye, at his lake house.

She walked through the glass doors to join him on the balcony; the water stretched out before them. "I thought you told me you were tired of this? That you didn't miss this place anymore?"

He turned his eyes toward the blond woman next to him before returning his gaze to the reflection of the sun on the water. "It's not the place I miss, I suppose."

He felt a finger drag over his jawline. "Is that regret I hear in your voice, Gaius?"

He snorted. "You of all people should know me better than that."

"Missed opportunities, then?"

An eyebrow raised. "A few of those." A beat. "All those pyramid games I could have gone to." Silence. For a moment, he was lost in thought, and then: "That was your scripture in there. One God, it said."

She nodded in agreement. "It did."

"I don't suppose you'd like to enlighten me as to what that was all about." In his mind's eye, he watched the finger of the woman in the red dress flit over the open pages of the old book, clutching as she did his hand in hers; saw Starbuck's terrified eyes as she backed away, arm out, as if warding off something terrible beyond description. "I imagine you'd probably say that I've been brought here for a reason."

Her eyes cut toward him, her voice chastening. "Everything happens for a reason, Gaius."

He let out a frustrated breath. "Then tell me, since you're so all-knowing: is there a reason why the things that work so perfectly in my mind fail so monumentally in practice?"

She didn't speak for a while. And then she smiled (sadly, he thought, which was strange: his Six, the one who inhabited his dreams, never seemed sad). "Why?" She paused. "I suppose it's because you're a lake house, and I'm a pyramid game."

***

"Two weeks' worth of algae."

Kara shook her head in frustration. "Two weeks? And how much water?"

Racetrack sighed. "Even less than that. Ten days, maybe just a week for six of us." She shrugged. "But, Captain, surely Galactica will come back for us. They'll know that the capacity of the Raptor is limited. They'll know that we're short on supplies." Her eyes were hopeful. "He'll realize he was making a mistake, Starbuck."

When she'd come out of the church, it was as though some of her fire had returned; they all saw it. There was a hard light in her eyes that spoke of determination. Now, she took a deep breath and ran a hand through her hair (longer, now, since she'd come back from the dead, but not as long as New Caprica; she felt like a different person). "I wouldn't count on it." She cut her eyes toward Baltar, who sat at the side of the church, back leaned back against it. His eyes were closed, his face tilted toward the sun. His lips moved slightly, as if he were whispering to himself. "Doctor?" His head jerked toward her, his eyes wide. "How were the radiation levels? Is there any chance we might be able to find plants? Fish? Animals?"

He stood carefully and walked toward them. "The levels are fine, but I've seen no signs of life. The planet was clearly decimated. Insects, maybe. Plants – perhaps." He took a few steps; bent down toward the rubble, where a solitary yellow wildflower pushed toward the light. "But I suspect we'd have to travel a long way to find plant life in enough quantity and variety to bear fruit. Most likely much closer to the equator."

"I might know where we can find food, and water."

They all turned toward Sam. The Cylon shuffled his feet self-consciously.

"I guess... well, I guess we were the last people here." His eyes cut toward Kara's. "I mean, the five of us, and you. And if we were the last people here, it would still be there. When we went to Galen's lab, after you'd left –" A nod toward his wife. "– there were supplies. There was water, preserved food. Not enough for us to have survived for the long-term, which is why we decided to leave, but enough for a while. And there were protein supplements, and sugar, and honey. I'm not sure how long it would have been good for, but I know that it was there for long-distance space travel. And their – our – technology was so backward. He expected us to be traveling hundreds of years." He shrugged. "It's worth a try, right?"

Each face held a different expression. D'Anna's: approval. The doctor's: esteem. Racetrack's: shock. Lee's: confusion.

It was Starbuck whose eyes he held, though; she watched him for a time. "Does this mean you remember, now? That you remember the Fifth?"

A slow nod. "I remember Tigh finding her, outside the lab. Him bringing her down. She was nervous, more than she should have been, you know? She kept fidgeting, playing with this pad of paper. And she lied." He took a half-step toward her, his eyes blazing as his mind drew the pieces together. "I asked her if she saw you, and she lied. I know it. You went after her, didn't you?" A pause. "There was blood under her nails. What happened, Kara?" They stared at each other, wide-eyed, transfixed.

"Who is she? Who's the Fifth?" Lee. His voice was choked, came out in something akin to a sob. His eyes sought Starbuck's, imploring. And she did open her mouth, did try to answer; but her voice resisted.

"Oh, _Apollo_." It was D'Anna who answered him (Starbuck watched with horror; _please, don't_). "Did no one tell you already?" She smiled. "It's your wife."


	3. Chapter 3

**Ghosts of the Past**

**by cliosmuse  
**

**Chapter 3  
**

It had caught her eye as soon as she stepped onto the Cylon Basestar, just after its return from the devastated Cylon hub. She had followed D'Anna through the ship's labyrinthine halls in wonder; had basked in the admiration of the copies that remained when she was introduced by the Three. And then she'd seen the glistening pool and was held rapt.

The first time she put her hand in the water, she thought she was going to die.

It was what she once imagined (in that life she had thought of as hers) it would be like to be struck by lightning, or to drop a hair dryer into the water while bathing.

It was _electrocution_.

Except she didn't die. With a small gasp, she pulled her hand back; looked around furtively at Starbuck's Leoben and one of the Sixes, deep in discussion.

But they didn't look her way (distracted, no doubt, by D'Anna's threatened slaughter of the Colonial hostages), so she slipped her hand back into the shimmery liquid. Electricity shot through her.

It was _addiction_.

The things that she felt! The things that she saw!

The fear of the hybrid, intense, visceral: as if it were her own.

The guilt and jealousy the Eight had known as she admitted to Helo her crime, her surreptitious theft of Athena's memories. The hot flutter that burned in her belly each time she looked at this man, her sister's husband. (She felt her desire.)

The anguish of the Leoben as he and one brother had watched from the Sixes' Basestar their own ship destroyed in civil war, all other copies killed, and then eliminated definitively in the explosion of the Hub; but the hope that danced in the back of his mind, now, even as he spoke of other things with the Six, that perhaps their deaths made him more _unique_, more _human_, made him something she might love, that angel who possessed his soul. (She felt his longing.)

And, distantly: the Cavils. Reeling in confusion as the hybrid jumped away from the Hub (in flames, she saw, through the Cavils' eyes). Now, regrouping. (She felt his rage.)

Without moving a muscle, she pushed out against the water, hot energy flowing out of her and into the ship. And she felt, from some great distance, that the Cavil felt _her_, and responded.

She pulled her hand back; the connection broke. Once again, she glanced around herself, trying to ascertain whether she had been spotted.

She _knew_, felt _certain_, that when the others put put their hands in the water, they didn't sense it in this way. They felt networks and data streams. They didn't feel this wholeness, this godlike knowledge of all. But they wouldn't: they were merely imperfect copies.

Tory smiled, then. It was _she_ who was perfect.

***

"Are you still having the dream?"

Laura Roslin started for a moment, then relaxed at her desk on Colonial One. It had been a day since the Fleet had left Earth; they'd jumped three times. (In an effort to evade the Cavils, Bill sad. But she knew that he just didn't want to stop. _If a shark stops swimming, it dies_.) "I'm sorry. I didn't hear you come in." Caprica stood before her, with her tall and easy grace. Her face was a mask of calm.

"You asked to see me. I assumed that you'd been seeing the Opera House again."

Laura took a deep breath. Took off her glasses; folded and unfolded them. Smoothed her hands over the ends of the hair of her wig. (Nervous gestures, all.) "I –" A pause. "Have you seen it again?"

Pity flashed briefly in the blond woman's eyes. (She had over the past weeks accustomed herself to the thought of death: but to know, to have to _wait_ for it. _Or perhaps_, she thought, _that's what I'm doing right now_.) She answered in a single word. "Yes."

Laura swallowed. "What... what does it mean, do you think?" A beat. "And please, sit."

She seated herself across from the president (pushing from her mind how intimately, _intimately_ familiar she was with this space); folded her hands in her lap. "I heard your address this morning on the wireless. It was very good. I think you've forestalled a panic."

"As much as I appreciate your saying so, you're changing the subject. I need to know what this dream means."

"I don't know what it means."

Disbelief; she couldn't hide it. The collective weight of it all was making her giddy, undisciplined. A burst of laughter escaped the president's lips. "Not a clue? Not the slightest idea? I find that hard to believe."

For a long moment, there was silence. Then: "Gaius was on the Raptor that went to Earth. Nothing's been officially made public, of course. But there's talk. Gossip. I'm certain he was on it."

Laura leaned back in her chair; steepled her hands. "Are you suggesting this dream may have something to do with Earth?"

When the Six didn't respond, the president stood; walked around her desk to stand before the other woman. Looking down at her, she leaned back into the desk, standing close enough to the seated Cylon that their knees just grazed. The straight hair of her wig fell long around her face. "Are you still in love with him?"

Caprica looked up from her lap, her eyes narrowed. "Just how much longer do you have to live?"

Laura sucked in a breath and glanced away just for a moment before returning her eyes to the Cylon's. She nodded. "All right. Hard questions. I understand that. _Quid pro quo_." A pause. "Three weeks. I have about three weeks." Silence, but Caprica's expression softened, her eyes shining with surprise (not at the _fact_ of it, but that she'd said it at all). "Now your turn." The next words with spaced emphasis: "Do you still love him?"

A breath: "Yes."

"Would you lie to me about this just to go after him?"

Another breath: "No." Then, more firmly. "No. I believe there is something on Earth. Something we were brought here to find. That Gaius was in the dream just confirms that. Nothing more." She closed her eyes, her final words coming rapidly, insistently. "And I believe that calamity awaits both our people if we don't act now."

The president's hand came to her chin, her fingers moving over it softly, thoughtfully. Then she nodded, stood, and returned to her chair; lifted the phone. "Ship to ship call for Sharon Agathon. Tell her it's the president."

***

The first time Tory put her hand in the water, she had no memory of Earth.

She had learned much since then. She understood her history, now.

Now, when her hand disappeared beneath the surface of the silver bath, she allowed the energy to pour through her, and she spoke back to it. D'Anna was gone; her feet were now planted firmly in Earth's grey dust. She breathed in the day, and Tory could smell its crispness. In an office on Colonial One, one that she was quite familiar with, Caprica and the president conspired. An emptiness remained where Starbuck's Leoben had presided, sickening in its finality; all of his memories forever lost. Somewhere on the Basestar, the last Leoben, carrying none of the memories, mourned his fallen twin and cursed his foolish obsession. But, rising above it all: confusion, now, and dread.

And where confusion reigns, leaders rise. This was the most basic rule of history. And it was the single tenet that Tory Foster had carried with her through her several existences. She smiled. She would be that leader.

Closing her eyes, she pushed into the water with her mind, harder and farther than she thought possible. What was needed, she knew, was unity. She called out for Cavil.

***

As the pulse went out, Earth's last four children, Samuel Anders, Galen Tyrol, Saul Tigh, and Anastasia Dualla – the survivors of a lost world – let out a collective gasp.


	4. Chapter 4

**Ghosts of the Past**

**by cliosmuse  
**

**Chapter 4  
**

He gasped and fell, hands and knees to the ground, and she was beside him in an instant (the déjà vu was powerful, took her to Caprica, making a deadly pact behind a barricade, and then back here, to Earth, leading his wounded form through the char and rubble).

"Sam! Look at me, Sam. Stay with me." She grabbed his chin, roughly; turned his head toward her; peered into his eyes. (Lee stood several yards away, bringing up the end of their small procession as he had been since their departure from the church. He shifted awkwardly from foot to foot.) Anders pulled his head away from her competent fingers, shook it slowly, and lifted himself to his knees. Her eyes didn't leave him. "What happened." It wasn't a question.

"I – I'm fine. It was just, all of a sudden – like I got the wind knocked out of me. Like something flew past me, knocked me over. Like a hard tackle."

She quirked an eyebrow, a sardonic smile on her face. "Pyramid analogies? At least that means you're okay."

He took a deep breath, pulled himself up, and dusted off the knees of his pants. Rubbing his jaw, he grinned. "Some grip, woman." She rolled her eyes, and the group began walking again. A few paces and then, eyes studiously trained away from her, his voice softer: "You look more like yourself."

She nodded slowly. "I feel more like myself."

"I'm glad, Thrace."

Fifteen more minutes of walking (this place so different than it was in their memories; bodies they once had to step over long decomposed, buried under centuries of dust, deep enough to nearly bury the front steps of the crumbling brownstones they passed). And now they were at Lookout Hill. There was no sign of the trap door that at one time had led the Five down to Tyrol's ship, the Apollo. Sam kicked the ground in frustration; shook his head and ran a hand through sweat-spiked hair. "It was _here_. I _know_ it was here."

"It still is." Kara nodded toward the ground. "It's been hundreds of years, Sam. We'll have to dig."

In the end, it wasn't so very deep. The wind had licked this hilltop, burying the hatch in one decade only to erode the land around it in the next. Within a couple of hours (Sam, Kara, Racetrack taking turns digging as the doctor and the Cylon watched, aloof; and Lee wandered the park, collecting his thoughts, trying to come to terms with his circumstances) they stared at a thick steel trap door in the ground. Sam knelt down to examine the old key pad which once provided industrious scientists access; but it was completely rusted out, wiring a blackened bundle. "Damn it. There's no way we're getting through that."

Kara smirked at him. "You can't be serious."

Grimacing: "What are you talking about?"

"Sam. You said you remember. Then you know what you're capable of. We don't need that." She pointed to the ruined keypad. She lowered her voice: "You can _do_ this, Sammy."

He took a deep breath and closed his eyes. "Gods know I wish I couldn't."

Crouching, then, he moved a hand toward the keypad (licked his lips slightly, nervously); and as the others watched the hand that hovered above the electronic system, a blue bolt shot from his fingertips, briefly dancing between his skin and the ground below him.

A slight clicking sound, then, and the hatch popped open, blasting cool, regulated air out toward them.

Then he – pyramid player, resistance fighter, child of Earth – stood, rubbing his hands against his thighs as if trying to clean them. His wife smiled up at him, her eyes dancing. "I knew you could do it."

***

The ship could have run a thousand years, Tyrol had told them, and it nearly did; and it seemed as though the lab had some similar life expectancy. They had cut the main generators when they left, but when the doctor had been able to start them again (with some ease, thanks to a jump-start from Anders), the computer bay had whirred to life. Secondary generators (powered by a self-sustaining reaction, like the ship) had kept the room climate-controlled enough to prevent excessive deterioration. Baltar, scientist-turned-prophet, had been all scientist again back in his element, pushing his glasses up his nose as he pored over the computer's stored data. And there had been some nourishment: Racetrack and Sam had set to work sorting through protein supplements, glucose shots, and many gallons of water.

Hours had passed now, and the others were resting; all but Lee, who had never come down to the lab. When she found him, he was sitting on the ground outside the hatch (in the same place, ironically, that his wife had been sitting hundreds of years earlier when she first met Saul Tigh), just visible in the light that spilled from the lab. Blackness and stars surrounded him.

She _was_, like Sam said, more like herself, he had to admit. It was the old Starbuck that had brought him back to reality after D'Anna's revelation about Dee. "Not now, Lee," she'd hissed, seeing him cut pained eyes toward D'Anna – and in a voice that didn't invite response. "You can think about this all you want later, but we don't have time for it right now." He'd looked at her; closed his mouth, which had dropped open at D'Anna's words, though he didn't seem able to properly formulate words. The surprise and anger had drained from his eyes; in their place, weariness. He felt exhausted.

If she'd looked, really looked in his eyes at that moment, he knew, she would have seen not just weariness but also betrayal. She'd treated him with a harsh impatience, and it stung. He'd brought her here, saved her life; but he felt, now they'd arrived, impotent and useless. Out of his depth. Tired. Hurt. Confused.

And so, when she found him, he was still sitting outside, still contemplating how very wrong he'd been about so much.

When she caught sight of him in the dim light, she took a breath. Nibbled on her bottom lip slightly as she struggled for words. In the end, she decided against originality.

"Hi."

He didn't look up from where his eyes were trained on his hands, clasped together, his arms encircling his knees. "Why didn't you tell me?"

Another deep breath, and she came to him; sat beside him, just far enough from him so that the cool night air passed between them unhindered. "There wasn't really time. Everything happened so fast."

"There _was_ time. You could have told me, any of a hundred times." A beat. "How am I the only person who didn't know this? My own wife."

It felt like a slap, and she looked down and away from him. Nodded once, sharply. Her voice soft but bitter: "Your wife."

The silence was thick for a moment, and awkward. He coughed. "You know, it occurred to me that... that _he_ knows so much more about you than I do. I've been thinking that Leoben was right, that I don't know you at all."

She winced and closed her eyes. She'd had a sense this was coming, that once he knew everything he'd run. She was no stranger to running. "Lee, you don't need to –"

In a rush, like one word: "No-wait." A beat. "What I mean is... there are things... things that I'd like to know about you. Things I never asked about. Because I was scared to hear what you'd have to say."

She tilted her head toward him warily. "What kinds of things?"

He hesitated; bit his bottom lip. Took a breath and drove ahead. "Like about your life before I knew you. Like what happened to you on Caprica. What happened to you on New Caprica. What happened to you here." He scrubbed his hands over his face. "It's like... I kept thinking, if I just didn't know about any of it, it wouldn't be _real_."

She swallowed thickly. "The last thing I need is your pity, Apollo."

"That's not what this is." He shook his head, blinked back – something. "And it's not a shoulder to cry on. I know you don't need that. It's more selfish than that. I want to feel like I know you again. And that you trust me, as much as you trust anyone."

She was quiet for a while. "You did ask about Caprica. A long time ago."

He nodded. "And you wouldn't tell me. But maybe I didn't really want to know. Maybe that's why I didn't press it."

Silence, again. He thought she might be about to leave when she spoke. "You're right. There are things you don't know." She sighed. "And I think it's time I told you one of them." She stood, dusted off her pants, turned, and began to walk away from him. He watched her in confusion until she turned her head slightly – a glance over her shoulder. "Are you coming? There's something I need to show you."


	5. Chapter 5

**Ghosts of the Past**

**by cliosmuse**

**Chapter 5**

In CIC, Saul Tigh doubled over as the shock-wave from Tory's call rolled over him. Swiped at the sweat on his brow, streaming down around his eyepatch: it was the feeling of being struck by lightning.

He wouldn't have noticed her reaction at all if Felix Gaeta hadn't rushed to her side, metal leg pounding the CIC floor. From his vantage point, bent over, he could see Gaeta leaning over her clumsily where she was hunched down to the floor. She was breathing hard and rubbing her face in her hands. The boy was whispering, again and again: "You're okay. You're okay."

And then it wasn't just the call that shook him (though it did, shook him still) but also a lifetime of memories: Helen, his first wife (so very, very different from Ellen, later); his boys (looking at him with such love in their eyes); his partner on the beat, shot dead in front of him on a routine traffic stop (pushed him to start drinking and never stop). The bench in that park in Brooklyn where he first met Anastasia Dualla.

He was up and walking over to her; pushed Gaeta aside and closed his fingers tight around her arm, tight enough to bruise. "Lieutenant Dualla, I need you to come with me." She was looking at him with wide eyes (greener than they usually were, with fear); and then she relaxed a little and nodded, just once. Throwing a glance over his shoulder at Helo (Bill still in his quarters; better but not fully recovered from recent events; and this, this revelation, this wouldn't help): "Captain Agathon, you have command."

Together – he led her roughly, but she wasn't unwilling – they walked out of CIC.

***

The knock on his hatch startled him. He looked down at the sleeping toddler in his lap; thought about setting him aside but, after the wave of _something_ that had just threatened to level him, he couldn't bear to let him go. So, pulling his son close to his chest, he stood and spun the wheel.

Tigh pushed past him into his quarters, pulling Dualla after him. (She stumbled a bit over the threshold.)

Tyrol inclined his head toward her as he watched her green eyes dart around the room. "What's she doing here?" Not that he had anything against her. Never had. But if he was going to talk to Tigh, he wanted to talk about what had just happened – the electric blast that had just ricocheted through his mind – and he didn't have much interest in having that conversation in front of her.

Tigh didn't let go of her – if anything, tightened his grip on her upper arm, shaking her slightly, as he pushed the words out: "It's _her_. Do you remember?"

He tilted his head and, narrowing his eyes, looking into those striking eyes of hers. "Her?" And, as he watched, he _did_ remember, all at once (like Tigh had; like Sam had). Remembered Saul (a young man of forty, in those days) bringing her down into the lab; remembered the Bible she'd clutched in one hand, and that little pad of paper she'd kept constantly in the other; remembered the look of amazement she'd fixed on his ship; remembered her lifting her voice to tell them – as they watched her in awe – that Starbuck was telling the truth, that they had to follow the course she'd mapped for them. "My gods." He looked back and forth between the two Cylons before him. "I don't understand. I remember setting out on the course she set for us and then going into stasis. And the next thing I remember... is enlisting. It doesn't make sense. And what about Starbuck? We all remembered her being there."

"She was." Her voice at that moment was as surprising to him as it had been in his lab a thousand years before. "She _was_ there. She left you to come find me."

Tyrol shook his head. "But didn't you tell us she came to you before the blasts?"

She nodded. "She did. And then she came to me again. And something... something horrible happened."

She stopped, and they couldn't tear their eyes away from her (Tigh's hand still clutching her arm). The Colonel: "Go on, girl. It's too long passed for guilt."

She swiped a hand across her eyes and took a shaky breath. "I –." Another breath. "I was scared. When I saw her, I was so scared. I – I shot her. I killed her. It was an accident." She was sobbing now. "It was an accident. I couldn't stop the blood. Just an accident."

Silence for a moment, her hitched sobs the only sound in the room, the shaking of her shoulders the only movement. Finally, Tigh swallowed. "And then you told Bill –"

"I – I told the admiral that she was the Fifth." Lips quivering: "I had just remembered. It was so much. It was too much...."

Tigh dropped her arm, suddenly, like it burned him. "Why didn't you hear the music?" Her answering gaze was full of confusion and pain.

Tyrol turned away, paced his floor once, twice, son balanced carefully, gently on his hip. "I think it was because of this." He nodded to himself. "The human brain –" At Tigh's quirked eyebrow, he amended: "_Our_ brains are remarkable instruments. They're built to take in infinite points of data and to filter them down into a manageable amount of information that we can physically and emotionally process. Think about sight – you and I could look at the same scene and notice completely different aspects of it – we could swear to the presence of completely different features – because our brains decided for us which things were the most important for us to notice. It's crucial, really. It's a defense mechanism. It keeps us sane. If we were to see everything –" He shook his head.

Tigh smirked. "Guess you're not just a knuckledragger anymore, are you, _Doctor_ Tyrol?"

Tyrol ignored him. "That's what repression is. A defense mechanism. The mind selects not to see certain things to protect itself from overload. Her mind wouldn't let her hear it, because it didn't want to remember."

"Well, tell me, Chief, if the mind is so all-powerful, why did she remember at all?"

Tigh shrugged. "You can't stop the tide."

Ana was breathing deeply, regaining her composure. "As interesting as this all is –" She swallowed. "I think right now we need to figure out –"

Tyrol blinked. "Who Tory just tried to call."

***

Few words had been spoken between Caprica Six and Laura Roslin in the space between the moment she made the call and that of Athena's arrival. When Sharon knocked on the hatch, they were both staring down at their laps, both deep in thought, ruminating on things said and unsaid. At the knock, Laura drew herself to her feet (though her hands were braced against her desk, for support). "Come in."

The Cylon walked in warily. "I can't stay long. I've left Hera with –"

"Lieutenant Agathon, have you been having the dreams?"

She swallowed thickly. Didn't want to tell them that every time she closed her eyes, she saw her little girl running farther and farther away from her grasp, into the waiting arms of the woman before her. "No."

Roslin nodded slowly; resumed her seat, steepling her hands in front of her lips. "You don't help Hera by lying, Lieutenant." A beat. "Please. Sit."

With a sidelong, leery glance at Caprica, Athena did. She didn't speak.

"When the visions first began, Captain Thrace told me that the hybrid had foretold them: the dying leader shall know the truth about the Opera House. And now Captain Thrace, provided she survived her spacewalk, is on Earth."

"With Gaius." Caprica.

Athena clenched her teeth. "Maybe so, but Hera's here. She's safe. And I'm going to keep her that way."

Laura took a deep breath. "I wonder if you can."

* * *

_Next chapter we're back to Earth, I promise. And I promise it won't take two months to get out. Hopefully you'll see one a week from this point on. In the meantime, please click below to review!_


	6. Chapter 6

**Ghosts of the Past  
**

**by cliosmuse**

**Chapter 6  
**

"So what am I looking at?"

They stood in a field in what had once been New Jersey. Across the water were the ruins of the city. It was late, by the time of this planet – that hour of night that's just barely morning. ("In the real dark night of the soul," wrote an author of Earth's Twentieth Century, "It is always three o'clock in the morning." He wrote about the city in the distance, wrote about the frivolous dreamers who lived there and their frivolous dreams.)

They'd taken the Raptor from the hatch where the others slept, and now its spotlight illuminated its wrecked and burnt-out cousin.

From behind him, she let out a surprised breath. "Lee, you can't expect me to believe you need me to tell you that."

He pushed a hand through long and unkempt hair (its length gave him years). Sighed. "No, I guess I can't, can I?" He gestured to it. "It's your bird. The one I saw explode, right?" He turned his head over his shoulder to search her eyes out. "Will you tell me what happened?"

She shrugged. "You've probably figured it out. Most of it doesn't matter. Just a few things. Just a few things really matter."

"So...." He paused, putting it all together in his head; giving it order. "I saw your Viper explode, and then somehow you were here." Looked for her nod; when he had it, he went on. "_Here_, where there'd been a holocaust of some kind. Where Sam, and Tigh, and Tory, and Tyrol, and" (voice catching just slightly) "Dee were." Another nod. "And then somehow they were on the Colonies, and you were back in the Fleet, flying beside me." He shook his head. "But the time discrepancy – _years_."

"Doesn't matter, Lee. That's not what matters."

"You – you _saw_ them here. Spent time with them here."

"That's not what matters, either."

He turned around then, hands on his hips, frustration on his face (eyes ringed by dark circles; he hadn't slept, not really, since two nights ago, when, sated and happy, he'd held her in his arms). "Then what _does_ matter, Kara?"

There was worry in her eyes. She nodded at the bird. "It's not just my Viper, Lee."

He tilted his head, a question on his face.

"There are bones, too."

He swallowed. "But –" A beat. A breath. "But they saw you. You saw them. You spent time with them." Another pause, and his face was serious and searching. "If you – if there had been a crash, how could that be?"

She bit her lip, swiped a stray tear from her cheek. "I don't remember everything yet, but I remember _that_. There wasn't a crash. I came back here, later." A long pause, then, and he wasn't sure she'd finish. But she did. "Lee, I shot myself. With the service weapon under my seat."

He closed his eyes, and the question he asked surprised her, made her catch her breath. He didn't express shock or disgust or fear. He seemed sad. "Why?"

She shrugged – realized he wasn't watching – said: "I didn't have anything to lose."

Opening his eyes, he took two long strides toward her, and then they were just inches apart (closer than they'd been since the airlock, when he'd pulled her to him, tight, said he couldn't lose her, said – _it will be over before you know it_). He lifted a hand; it hovered beside her cheek so that she could just barely, almost feel it. Whispering: "Is that how you felt on Galactica? When –" Couldn't finish.

She shook her head; her eyes were somewhere else, searching herself; her few tears had dried. "No. No, it was entirely different. That time I had too much to lose. That was about.... About learning to let go." A deep breath, and as much to herself as to him: "Because he was right. When you finally face it, it's beautiful. Become who you really are." She held out her arms to her sides, to the vast emptiness of the black world around them. "Leoben told me this was the space between life and death. I'm not sure why." She let out a nervous laugh. "So. Not often you meet a girl who's killed herself twice, right? You should consider yourself lucky, Adama."

His eyes didn't waver from hers; he followed her little steps back inch for inch. His voice was low: "I think it's safe to say I consider myself lucky." Blood pounded in his ears.

And then she wasn't backing away anymore, but leaning into him, clinging to him, her arms wrapped behind his, her fists clutching the fabric around his shoulders, her words spoken into his shoulder: "But I need you to tell me what it _means_ to you."

Running a hand lightly over her back, he whispered in her ear: "I'm always having to prove myself to you, Kara. Have you ever noticed you never have to prove anything to me? Angel, ghost, devil, I don't care. It doesn't matter. You're Kara. Just like you said."

"I guess I just don't understand why."

"Because of what I keep telling you. I _love_ you. And I meant what I said yesterday." (Had it really just been yesterday?) "_This_ is my destiny, Kara. To be here with you. Until the end."

He felt her shift and imagined the little smile she pressed into his shoulder. A smile which became, in turn, a little laugh (the kind of Kara laugh he hadn't heard since – since before she died, at least). When she spoke, her voice was still low, but there was a different quality to it. "Lee? Listen, Lee. This is important. I don't feel any more pain. For the first time in my life, I don't feel any pain."

"Kara? I'm glad."

They stood like that until just before light broke.

***

And that was how they came to find themselves, later that morning, sitting alone together before a weatherworn tablet (bronze eagle of the long-devastated memorial after all these hundreds of years still in motionless flight nearby). They had stood unmoving for some time in that field where she'd died, until he convinced her to come to the Raptor, to close her eyes for just a while. But almost as soon as she was asleep on the floor of the vessel (clinging to him; so very different from just a few hours earlier, when they'd been on the floor of this same bird, right after she'd heard the shots that took Leoben's life) she was awake again, screaming: a nightmare.

In the first of the morning light, then, she'd flown him to this space, across the water from the Viper. The words on the tablets, she'd said, she'd carved long ago. They looked like the most ancient carvings from the most ancient tombs on Gemenon, faint traces of color just visible deep in the pockets of the grooves. They'd walked among the stones. She'd run her fingers over their lines. And then, she'd come to this one and stopped; backed away from it fast until her back hit the stone behind her hard enough to stun. And, not tearing her eyes from the stone, she'd crumpled to the ground.

He didn't think – just went to sit beside her. "Kara? What... what's wrong, Kara?" He touched her arm; withdrew his hand quickly but stayed close.

She shook her head, her eyes wide. "Lee... can't you see what this means? It's my fault, Lee. It's what the hybrid said, but I didn't understand it then. 'You are the harbinger of death, Kara Thrace....'"

He whispered the words that were chiseled deep into the stone, by her own hand: "You will lead them all to their end."

"And I did, Lee. I told Tyrol how to get to the Colonies. I drew maps, star charts. And they _did_ come, Lee. They _did_ come." She swallowed. "And the worlds ended. The worlds ended, Lee. And it was my fault."

***

end chapter 6

* * *

_Comments appreciated, as always. Just click below. :-)_


	7. Chapter 7

**Ghosts of the Past  
**

**by cliosmuse  
**

**Chapter 7  
**

"Are we sure it was Tory?" Tigh sat on the floor of Tyrol's bunk, back against the wall, elbows on his knees.

Tyrol sighed from where he sat at the edge of his bunk, Nicky cradled in his lap. "No. We don't know enough to determine that for certain. What we _do_ know is that, from what you say, no one else in CIC seemed to react to what we felt, which suggests that there's something in particular about us that allowed us to receive the –" He paused, fumbling for a word, settled on: "– transmission."

From his position on the floor: "Could it have been some kind of test – a diagnostic test of the Basestar?"

Dee was pacing the room restlessly. "We would have known. You have I have both been in CIC for hours. It _was_ her. You both _know_ it was her. You _felt_ it." Her eyes moved back and forth between them, searching them out, pleading. "You _heard_ it. It was a – a beacon. A homing beacon. And it wasn't directing at us. It went past us. Far, far past us." A pause. "It could only have been to Cavil."

Tigh grunted. "You're right. I don't want to admit it, but you're right."

Tyrol, with a nod: "If she was calling Cavil, then it means that the rebel Cylons must not know. We should notify the Basestar."

Tigh pushed himself to his feet. "Not before we tell Bill."

Fear, briefly, in Dee's eyes, but she pushed it down. "Why would she do this?"

His face hard, his eyes dark (Nicky pulled tightly, protectively against his chest), Tyrol took a deep breath. "Because she's Tory."

***

Standing in the president's office, Athena narrowed her eyes. "I can take care of my child. I'm her _mother_."

Laura Roslin's eyes softened. She pulled her glasses off her nose and watched Athena carefully for a moment before speaking. "I don't doubt that you would die trying, Lieutenant Agathon. But something very powerful is at work here. Your daughter is –" She broke off. How to summarize her feelings about a child who'd once saved her life, whom she'd tried to kill, whom she'd stolen from her mother? "– special. Your daughter is special. These visions we've had – we've shared – they mean something. And they've convinced me that the only way to protect your child is for us to return to Earth."

Some of the anger had dropped from Athena's face. She took a few deep breaths (they spoke of resignation). "What do you need me to do?"

Roslin held her eyes for a time, then nodded one. Cutting her eyes to the blond woman, still seated before her, then back to Athena: "I need you, Lieutenant, to make sure your daughter is safe with your husband so that we can return to Earth." She turned her eyes down. "And I need to find a way to tell Bill."

***

A knock on his hatch. He looked up from his drink. "Come."

The hatch swung open, and in walked his former XO, his former deck chief (holding his son), and his former daughter-in-law. He took a breath; tried to collect himself. "Saul, what's going on here?"

"A lot, Bill."

He took off his glasses; pinched the bridge of his nose. The room around him was still chaotic but better than before (Laura had picked through the worst of the wreckage before her appointment with Cottle). With a sigh: "When is there not?" A beat. He tapped the side of his glass once, twice. "Well?"

But his old friend didn't respond; looked, instead, toward Dualla, his expression comforting. "Go ahead, girl. We're right here."

She took a deep breath, her green eyes wide. "Sir –" She paused; glanced over at Tigh, then Tyrol. Then, with her eyes back on his and a deep breath: "Admiral, I lied to you."

His brow wrinkled. "Lied? About –" And then he remembered. One day, or was it two days, before – before he'd arranged Starbuck's execution, before Apollo had gone to her, nearly died with her, before he'd (having watched his son, Kara in his arms, throw himself through space into the waiting Raptor) gone to the brig, dragged Leoben up by the hair, put a gun to his head, and pulled the trigger – she'd knocked on his hatch, her eyes wide, tearful. What she told him: that she'd overheard Kara talking to Leoben in a secluded part of the ship. That they they were conspiring to broadcast the Fleet's location to the Cavils.

She told him that Kara had betrayed him.

His voice barely there, his words a confirmation of what he knew, meant as much for himself as for her: "You lied about Kara."

She nodded (light reflecting off a tear on her cheek). Lips parted, quivering, like she wanted to say something, but nothing came out.

As he watched her, his anger grew. His jaw set firmly; his eyes bored into her. And then, without warning, he stood. "You lied about Kara and kept quiet even when you knew I meant to execute her." His voice frightening in its fury: "What _possible_ explanation could you have for your behavior?"

She didn't respond; just stood before him, dumb, her lips still parted, her eyes still wide. From behind her, Saul's voice, nudging: "Lieutenant, explain yourself to the admiral. That's an order."

"I –" She swallowed. "The conversation I described to you never happened. Captain Thrace and Leoben Conoy never planned to contact Cavil. I – I lied to you to protect myself."

His voice no less angry; if anything, more: "From _what_, Lieutenant?"

"From her. From what she might do when she remembered what I did to her. What I did to her on Earth."

"On Earth...." He took in her words, made sense of their meaning; looked pained as he realized their implication. "You're the Fifth."

She didn't deny it. Quiet for a time: the only sound in the room his breath as he pushed it out his nose. And then: "Get out."

"Sir?"

"Leave, Lieutenant. I've already done one thing I can't take back. Don't make me do another."

And she did. Eyes still wide, she turned, almost tripping in her haste to get to the hatch and through it. Tigh and Tyrol didn't move (though Nicky let out a whimper); but they shared a glance.

Bill fixed them with his gaze. "Did you know about this?"

"No, Sir." Tyrol. "We came here as soon as we found out."

Tigh, his voice gruff: "That's not all, Bill."

At his desk, he nodded. "It never is, is it?"

***

When the president arrived at the admiral's quarters on Galactica some time later (Caprica and Athena still on the flight deck), he was sitting on his leather sofa alone, elbows on knees, eyes fixed on nothing in particular. But he looked more together than he had in days, and she breathed a sigh of relief.

"Bill –"

"You were right, Laura."

She cocked her head; walked over slowly, delicately, to sit on the sofa beside him (careful to leave some space between them as she gauged him). "About what, Bill?"

"About me. About why I did what I did." A beat. "I was punishing myself for letting down the Fleet. Lashing out at anyone I could blame. I almost killed her over my sense of –" A breath. "Shame. Over my shame."

"But you didn't."

"Because of Lee."

"Yes. Because of your son. Because he loves her."

Faintly: "Because he loves her." There was quiet for a time, and then he spoke again, his voice hesitant. "Laura, I was wrong."

"Yes, you were. But she's alive. You can be glad for that."

"No. I was wrong about her. What I did – it was based on a lie. She was telling the truth."

She nodded but didn't seem surprised. In her eyes was pity, yes, but also something like whatever it was that was so potently present in the look Lee had given Kara, in the airlock: fierce protectiveness, devotion, love. It caught him in the chest, in the gut, and he sucked in a breath. "Bill – I came to tell you that we need to go back. I need to go back, to Earth. There's something there for me. I think it may be the key to everything."

She was dying. Would be dead. A matter of weeks, Cottle said. And at that moment, he wanted to give her whatever she wanted. "The Fleet can't go back, Laura. Tory Foster has sent a message to the Cavils that survived the destruction of the Hub. Tigh's working with Gaeta on a new series of jump coordinates. We need to get far away from here. And we can't risk leading them to Earth."

"Bill –"

"But that doesn't mean you can't go." He reached out across the sofa for her hand. "If it's what you want."

She smiled as she leaned forward; wrapped her arms around him tightly. A whisper in his ear: "It is, Bill. It really, really is."

***

end chapter 7

* * *

_This has become something of a struggle to write! Not because I don't know where it's going – I've known that since the beginning – but because 4.5 knocked a lot of the enthusiasm for BSG out of me. Also, what with the recent glut of post-4.5 stories, I'm not sure how much interest there is in a story like this – evidenced by how little response a Lee/Kara chapter (the last one) got! That said, even if there's not much reader interest anymore, I don't like to leave things incomplete, so I will work through this. I hate the idea of someone finding it someday and not knowing what happens! Because what happens is going to be pretty damned cool. At least I think so.  
_


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